About

RickB- Human, Artist, Fool.

Ynys Mon, UK.

The blog is called ten percent because of what Kurt Vonnegut wrote when remembering Susan Sontag - She was asked what she had learned from the Holocaust, and she said that 10 percent of any population is cruel, no matter what, and that 10 percent is merciful, no matter what, and that the remaining 80 percent could be moved in either direction.-

And I'm writing it because I need the therapy and I lust for world domination.

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This is a slick marketing operation to make money off the poorest people, disgusting. Given how much the govt. bailed out the banks and in fact own one they could have put into place regulations that mean people on benefits get free banking, of course they didn’t which tells its own story (even as neoliberalism is being proven not to work).(ht2 The Socialist Way)

People in some of the poorest parts of the country are having benefits paid onto pre-paid cards, but many are not aware of the costs involved. An internal e-mail from the Department for Work and Pensions expresses concern at the lack of customer awareness. One benefit office has received requests to pay benefits for almost 100 people directly onto these pre-paid cards, which incur charges.

The card providers say the cards promote financial inclusion. However when staff at the Clyde and Fife Benefits Delivery Centre contacted customers before processing the requests, they found that the majority of customers were not aware of the charges.

One of the companies mentioned in the e-mail sent 46 applications to the benefit office requesting benefits to be paid on to a GO: Card. The forms were accompanied by a letter from Go Money Solutions sales director, Steve Tobin. In the letter Mr Tobin says the forms were obtained “through face to face marketing” in the local area.

A GO: Card costs £10 to buy and a £7.50 annual management fee is charged after the first month. It costs a minimum of £1.25 and a maximum of £2.50 to have each benefit loaded on to the card and the same charges apply for each cash withdrawal.

Royal Mail will recruit up to 30,000 temporary staff to deal with upcoming strikes by postal workers and the Christmas rush, the service has said. The Communication Workers Union has called two nationwide strikes next week over pay, conditions and reform. The firm said it would hire twice the usual number of extra pre-Christmas staff to cut the impact of “unjustified and irresponsible” industrial action. But the CWU said managers should be talking, not “planning for failure”. The 24-hour strikes will begin on 22 October. On the first day, mail centre staff and drivers will strike. The next day it will be delivery and collection staff.

And guess what, because of the ‘crisis’ (the creators of which are currently paying themselves multimillion pound bonuses) there are lots of unemployed people and because of welfare privatisation and ‘reform’ they cannot survive for long or take work of their choice, see how that works?

Mark Anthony France has been sacked by the DWP for…well being an engaged citizen in a democracy, one reason given was he commented on Harpymarx’s site, watch and hear the hilarious slight sneer as the BBC reporter says the name. It is notable the criminal activities of a Tory MP do not get her sacked but pointing them out does get a worker sacked, hmmm.

Mark who works at Bromsgrove Job Centre [as a Grade B Admin Officer earning £14,700 a year] organised the petition that called on Julie Kirkbride MP to resign immediately [ Julie is reported to have had an income of £266,000 last year]

The good news is though people who want to study betrayal won’t need to attend university to learn about it, all you need to know is manifested in New Labour’s every move-

Bursaries for England’s poorest students will no longer have to cover the gap between grants and fees. The Office for Fair Access (Offa) has decided the minimum bursary universities must offer if they charge fees should be 10% of the fee level. Currently it has to make up the difference between the £3,290 annual fee and the maximum grant of £2,906. For next year grants are frozen but fees go up. The bursary will be £55 short of the £384 difference. Offa’s move follows revised guidance from the Higher Education Minister, David Lammy.

NUS vice-president Aaron Porter said: “Today’s announcement is nothing short of shameful. “In 2004, we were told that universities would only be allowed to charge top up fees if they guaranteed that poorer students would not be out of pocket. The government has now gone back on its word.”

Sally Hunt, the general secretary of the University and College Union, said: “I cannot understand why a government that is looking so hard at social mobility has taken the decision to charge the poorest students more money to attend university.”

According to the Cabinet Office, Lord Mandelson sits on 35 of the 44 Cabinet committees and sub-committees which oversee government business. He sits on more committees than either the prime minister, the chancellor or the foreign secretary. These include areas such as health, immigration, climate change, trade, Africa, Olympics planning and food.

He’s not elected and “intensely relaxed about people getting filthy rich, as long as they pay their taxes”. The UK’s reputation globally is that of a tax haven, a situation engineered and promoted by… New Labour, so no wonder rich Lords can be so ‘relaxed’.

Calculate the Minimum Income you should be getting here. (ht2 Don Paskini@LC). Apparently the income I require based on what the public think is £220.33, which is great, that would be very nice, I roll on less than half that. As jailhouselawyer in the comments @LC says-

According to the DWP the government has decided that £55 pw is the minimum I need to live on. This being the case, how could MPs decide that they should receive £100 pw just for food?